Grow up baby boys

My son told me his friends think I’m a bitch. At first I was a little hurt. But he explained, “you were just being you.” And I know what he meant by that, I was challenging them to move forward and start their adult lives.

We had been at a quasi-graduation party for one of his friends, who completed college this spring.

The friend who we were celebrating recently started a new sales position, one that his mom didn’t encourage because it was totally commissioned sales, no salary, no guarantees. She was hoping that he would find a job in a large corporation with some safety net. But those are rare, and there really is no safety net anyways; that’s an illusion. Perhaps she meant more of a conventional job where you start at the bottom, train, gradually advance and become a professional.

He started out with “sink or swim” as his job description. But you know what happened? After an awkward couple of weeks of cold-calling (he is selling high end shears to hairdressers in salons for a California company that has no representation on the east coast and so the entire territory is open to him), he has started to rack up sales and earn at least $800 to $1000 a week! Why? Because there is no incentive like seeing actual money for the results of your efforts. He is enjoying the thrill of learning how to confidently sell that he even sacrifices socializing on some weekends because he wants to get in as much selling as possible.

This is what it is like to be hungry. This is what our young people don’t have today. Yes, he is able to get up and running because he is still living at home with his mom. But most people do need that segue, and you don’t mind providing it, for a limited time.

He is now saving his money to get an apartment in the city, and he can’t get there fast enough. And he has a valuable asset now: he believes that he will be able to earn a living, no matter what. If this falls through, he can sell anything.

He’s not the one who thinks I am a bitch though. It was two of their other friends from high school, who are still living home because “they haven’t kicked me out yet.” How telling is that? The parents are waiting for the kids to get some initiative, and the kids are coasting because it’s easy. I was teasing them that they should get an apartment together, grow up, become more independent. Come on already. They are not being helped by stalling their flight from the comfortable nest. Their parents could at least charge them rent (money is a powerful incentive to gain independence). And even their dissatisfaction with their jobs (at least they are working!) doesn’t make them seek better ones because they are stuck all the way around. Their stagnation is hard to witness.

My son defended me, saying that he was glad I expected him to launch on time and get started. He told me that what I said to his friends was nothing he hadn’t already said to them. He’s sad to think they will be left behind as they have less and less in common, as they don’t move forward.

The friends inaccurately think my son is doing well because we “bought him a house.” My son and I bought a house together because mortgage rates are low and he could pay the same amount to build equity as to rent an apartment. And he has learned the value of hard work, the pride of homeownership; he is ahead of the game. Yes, I provided the down payment, which I will take back when we flip it. But he pays the mortgage, which is in his name only (building credit), the taxes, the utilities. It’s his place.

His scissor-selling friend and he are planning to move and share an apartment in New York City next spring, because “we’re young and we’re crushing it.” We’ll probably rent out my son’s house to create an income stream until prices increase and we can sell it. Another lesson in creating your own wealth, success and future.

That’s the enthusiasm and spark I like to see, the self-starting, the initiative. That’s what will carry them through life.

16 Responses

Ah, yes, the dreaded “bitch” mom – that is me too, to some of my son’s friends … they are now approaching 30! It’s one act of name calling I don’t mind – at least some of my son’s successes are due to the fact that he heard us, and saw us living, the work hard, keep struggling and always strive to be your best lifestyle!

Hmmm. The writing out the checks part with money from a job that you got because you are young, fresh faced and smooth talking (and because your parents “knew somebody”) isn’t really work. Even going to Lowe’s to pick out new flooring for the home your parents helped you buy isn’t the work…that’s the fun. Or cooking the meal for the dinner party that you have at the home your parents helped you buy…still not work…fun again.

Eating crap, wearing crap, and living in crap for years while you don’t go out and sacrifice so you can buy a modest home years later is the work.

So, the maintenance part of home ownership (the fun part…if he was even doing that) got too hard and boring, and now he gets to live in the City while he collects income from a home he didn’t really buy outright? Doesn’t sound like much of an accomplishment to me. It just sounds like you are a little more successful than your son’s friends parents and you had the ability to buy him a place to live outside of your own home, as well as a great start on a retirement fund. I don’t think that’s teaching him anything except class differences.

Further, all of this is still giving local, state, and federal gov’t folks an inaccurate picture of how unaffordable rent, food, etc. has become for young people today. Everyone’s parents is helping their kids out in some sort of way (with phone bills, insurance, etc.), and/or their kids are whoring it with a random live in gf/bf for years until one or both is too wrinkled, useless and infertile to find anyone else. This is not good when my generation won’t have the inheritance/pension/wealth built from having a good job for years “safety net” to help their own kids with someday.

What I mean about the young, fresh-faced and good looking stuff is that after 30, you’re not the young person in the office anymore and your novelty has worn off. People don’t think everything you say is cute, and people aren’t as likely to want to teach you new things. A lot of 20-somehings have been stuck in not-so-great jobs for many years where they haven’t been able to save much or buy a home, and 10 years later they often find that not much has changed except that they now have bags under their eyes and people aren’t as eager to hire them. In other words, you have helped your son avoid more upcoming struggles and pitfalls in his life than you even realize. So, don’t be quite so quick to judge when your son’s friend from a poorer family is pot-bellied, bald and living in a dirty little bungalow some years from now while your son is in a nice Clifton Park development.

Yes, you have to be hungry and you can’t rely on Obama (dirty word) for everything. But there are a lot of young, hungry people with failed businesses, pink slips from big 10 firms, and working their butts off in some private sector firm in Upstate NY that is taxed so much they can’t afford to pay their employees much.

The parents of his friends are on a similar par of middle income. The advantage we have is that my husband and I are a 35 year team and it is much easier with a couple to provide for their children than a single parent. But again I stick to my belief that regardless of your circumstances, EVERYONE has the opportunity to pick themself up and improve their situation. There is still nothing like hard work: the harder I worked, the luckier I got. My husband and I started in a studio apartment, with a 9″ black and white TV, 1 car (I took the bus until I saved up a down payment on a car) and we have earned every single thing we have in our comforatble life.

There is nothing wrong in your encouragement of your son purchasing a home with your help (smart advice). It teaches him responsibility and he will see that. I totally agree with you in that young people need the push and certainly not all parents do that with their children. So, kudos to you for encouraging your son and I’m sure he is a responsible young man and will thank you for your help. AND NO YOU ARE NOT A “B”. These young friends of your son are jealous because they are not getting any direction from their parents.

Wow – you’re bankrolling your son because you’re financially able to (which is perfectly fine), but then complain about other kids’ lack of initiative? I wonder if their mommies put the down payment on houses for them as well…

It’s easy to be successful and “independent” when mommy and daddy essentially provide everything (college tuition, down payments for houses, etc.) that got their children to where they are.

read the rest of the words Tom, I’m not “bankrolling.” if we didn’t invest in a house together (he’s paying all the costs of living there), he’d be living in an apartment, that he also would be paying all the costs of. This was an investment for me too, in real estate, and in my son’s future. He has had a job since he was 15. We rightfully (as a parent should do) helped to launch him into the world, but after you open a door, they have to walk through it themselves, perform and keep on going. Kids’ lack of initiative comes directly from parents and their expectations. By continuing to “bankroll” your child’s sloth (living at home with all the services parents provided while you were growing up), you are just delaying their start and sense of self-worth.

I agree with your contention that condoning and supporting a child’s sloth can lead to a lack of initiative, stunted development and a lack of self-worth.

But I think by providing your son with a down payment on a house is bestowing a distinct advantage for him during this stage in life relative to the majority of other young people his age. Many employed people can afford to pay rent/monthly mortgages and their other monthly expenses; that is the easier part. What is much more difficult is saving up enough for years and years in order to accumulate enough for that down payment in the first place. That’s wonderful that you can do that for your child, but when you’ve given him this major advantage (and presumably the other young adults you mention were not given such advantages) the playing field is skewed in your child’s direction. I’m not saying that your son hasn’t earned anything, but it sure makes life easier when you’re given a down payment for a house.

Perhaps the other kids you mention do not have as much intrinsic initiative as your son or his salesman friend, or perhaps you did a better job of instilling initiative in your son, but perhaps also part (not all, just part) of your son’s drive and success is related to the financial safety net that is provided by his parents.

No Chinese immigrant parents would condone a lack of ambition in their sons or daughters. And this may indicate a problem of America’s current non-immigrant culture … too many parents have not encouraged hard work and discipline while raising their children, instead allowing peer pressure and the thought that “children need to find their own way” to dominate how our kids grow up. The problem, a surfeit of unambitious, slackers who are not ready for the challenges of the 21st Century job market. As a former high school teacher and adjunct college lecturer, it was easy to see which of my students had drive and discipline, and which expected an easy path ahead of them. Parents are partially to blame. But somehow, TV and the media set a tone that parents like Valerie who demanded much of their children were to be shunned. Valerie has a good point, and more Moms and Dads ought to become Tiger Moms and Tiger Dads.

I don’t think you’re a bitch at all. You sound like a great mom who allows your child(ren) to mature and grow. I moved away from Albany 5 years ago and although I go back often to visit my family, they’re proud of me that I’m able to sustain myself and I couldn’t imagine moving back now. I’m too independent and love having my own place. As a 20-something though, dating is interesting as many of the men I meet live at home so we often hang out at my place since I’m the only one without parents walking in and out of the house. Great post!